OSNews

Hardware is just part of the equation: Apple's phones have a complete ecosystem of the AppStore and software that's easy to find, that's not written for the lowest common denominator, like most cell phone software, and is also cheaper by comparison for what it does. Even if the hardware is comparable in native functions and the software is better in some feature checkmark manner, it doesn't mean it's comparable, or not: once you have it, what can you do with it in addition to the standard functionality? Or, in other words: what are you really wanting to do with your hardware once you've got it, and what do you want to use it for besides strictly a phone? And what sort of support do you get from the company? And therein lies the major distinction with Apple's fairly unified (at least for now) platform that also encompasses the iPod Touch: a commonality of hardware and software capacity, combined with a larger ecosystem, that means people have a large enough other customers to allow software to be cheaply available, that uses the hardware to full advantage, and also has a rather long-term software update support system already in place and well-tested with a history: that's not been the common thread of previous cell phones, or smart phones, of having the same general OS being freely updated and having functionality added over time. So, to recap: hardware at time of release is just one factor in the equation, as is the software at release: the hardware may not change for that model, but is there enough of that particular hardware model to have a full, long-lasting unfragmented ecosystem to make it better over time, or, like so many other cell phones, does it end up being like most things before it, where people throw them away after 6 months for the new hotness, because there's no long-lasting added value derived after that point, because it's no longer supported much (if at all) by the seller/maker, and software is just so-so, and expensive?